While many athletes worldwide are putting final touches to their preparations for the global sports extravaganza, local athletes are racing against time to qualify for the event. Thus far, only five athletes are certain of participation at the games. Amantle Montsho, Pako Seribe, Nigel Amos, Isaac Makwala and Oteng Oteng are the only athletes to have qualified. With little results coming from the preparations, the Botswana National Olympic Committee (BNOC) Local Organising Committee (LOC) goes into a retreat this weekend to map the way forward.
The BNOC has set a target of sending 20 athletes to the games and a May 10 deadline had been set for qualification. However, the BNOC later said athletes will be sponsored for the qualifiers even after the deadline, but under certain conditions. This week the committee issued a press release that the LOC has provisionally extended the deadline for qualification to May 31st and a final cut off date will only be announced after the weekend retreat.
